Kinda OT: Basketball home NC schedule sucks, bad as FB

Hillsdale College, seriously? New Jersey Institute of Technology, really? Nicholls St., Coppin St. I'll rush right to buy tickets!

OK, EMU comes to town, at least a MAC school. Now there's 2 TBD teams for the Legions Classic before M heads to Brooklyn for games 3 & 4 of the Classic. I'm guessing 2 cupcakes will come to M. The 2 teams M will play at Barclays Center will be either VCU or Oregon, then Villanova.

The marque game of course is Syracuse on dec. 2nd. Next best game is SMU lead by Larry Brown on 12/20.

(OK I know there's a BB forum, but nobody has been on it since end of june)

http://www.mgoblue.com/sports/m-baskbl/spec-rel/071514aaa.html

Completely disagree. There are cupcakes like that every year.

vs Villanova
vs VCU
vs SMU
vs Syracuse
at Arizona

....that is a very respectable amount of good OOC games. Michigan plays in the most difficult conference on CBB, so loading up the Non Conference schedule really doesn't make much sense.

Beilein's comments (per UMhoops.com)

“As in our previous years, we will have a very challenging non-conference schedule,” said U-M head coach John Beilein. “Each game provides our young team with different challenges before heading into Big Ten play. We are thrilled to be going back to Brooklyn and the Barclays Center for games with VCU or Oregon and then Villanova. All three are perennial NCAA Tournament teams and those games will be a terrific opportunity to be tested early.

“Having the opportunity to host two Hall of Fame coaches like Syracuse’s Jim Boeheim and SMU’s Larry Brown gives us two significant home games which will no doubt provide electric atmospheres at Crisler Center. If our return game at Arizona is anything like last year’s thrilling game, it could be one the best college basketball games of the season. Once again, we expect our overall strength of a schedule will be one of the best in the NCAA.”

Yeah, I think the schedule is better than usual.

But I believe he was talking about the OOC HOME schedule.

He's right. It blows.

vs SMU (was on pace to be a top 15 team)
vs Syracuse (always one of the best teams in the country)

......that alone makes it not suck.


For comparison, I'll post some other OOC schedules.

Duke:

Friday, Nov. 14 vs. Presbyterian

Saturday, Nov. 15 vs. Fairfield(Coaches vs. Cancer Campus Sites, will square off against Binghamton/Endicott native KJ Rose)

Tuesday, Nov. 18 vs. Michigan State

Friday, Nov. 21 vs. Temple (Coaches vs.Cancer Classic, Brooklyn, NY)

Saturday, Nov. 22 vs. Stanford or UNLV (Coaches vs.Cancer Classic, Brooklyn, NY)

Wednesday, Nov. 26 vs. Furman

Saturday, Nov. 30 vs. Army

Wednesday, Dec. 3 at Wisconsin (ACC/Big Ten Challenge)

Monday, Dec. 15 vs. Elon

Thursday, Dec. 18 vs. UConn (Izod Center, E. Rutherford, N.J.)

Monday, Dec.29 vs. Toldeo

Wednesday, Dec. 31 vs. Wofford

Sunday, Jan. 25 at St. John's

You're right.

It doesn't suck.

  

Last year, Michigan's home OOC schedule was:
UMass Lowell
South Carolina St.
Coppin St.
Houston Baptist
Arizona
Holy Cross


Michigan still finished with the #9 overall Strength of Schedule.


Like I said, this is no different than any other year. When you play in the best conference in the country, you don't need to load you OOC with marquee opponents. Still, there are 5 games that should be really good.

Yes, Syracuse is a GREAT program, a high quality team, great home NC game.

Yes, SMU another very good team coached by Larry Brown, NIT champs last yr.

Arizona on the road, Villanova, Oregon/VCU neutral site games, yes fantastic games, national exposure playing in NYC against NCAA-T caliber teams.

100% AGREE, those 5 games are fantastic!!!

I was talking about home games vs NJIT, Hillsdale, Coppin St & Nicholls St. Hard to get excited or want to go out & spend money buying tickets for those 4 teams. That's all I was saying. Average fan hard to get excited as well for those 4 teams. Now that M has become a incredible program, fans are more apt to buy tickets for these 4 teams than in the past. 6 yrs ago be lucky M could sell 5,000 seats each for these 4 teams.

Looking at Dukes NC schedule, they have several home cupcakes. I'm sure majority of teams have a lot of home NC cupcakes, directional schools on the schedule.

GO BLUE!!!

Right on. Full disclosure, I've never been to a game at Crisler so it's a lot easier for me to give them a pass for what games are home vs what games are away.

In basketball, you are routinely playing 2-3 games a week. You need the cupcakes sprinkled in between because otherwise there just wouldn't be enough time to work on things. Also, in basketball it is much more common for underclassmen to play significant roles so throwing them to the sharks time and time again at the beginning of the season isn't a great idea.

Louisville's 5 marquee OOC games.

Minnesota
Ohio State
Indiana
Kentucky
Western Kentucky


Arkansas' 5 marquee OOC games:

@ SMU
@ Clemson
@ Iowa State
Wake Forest
Dayton

MGoBlog: "Non-conference schedule set, Challenging"
http://mgoblog.com/content/basketball-nonconference-schedule-set-challenging